


let me hold your heart

by lailizabeth



Category: Supernatural
Genre: 300th episode, Angst and Feels, Cas is an angel, Coda, Episode: s14e08 Byzantium very briefly implied, Episode: s14e13 Coda, Episode: s14e13 Lebanon, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Season/Series 14, because he almost loses cas, dean gets spooked, of course
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-08
Updated: 2019-02-08
Packaged: 2019-10-24 10:27:34
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,101
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17702633
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lailizabeth/pseuds/lailizabeth
Summary: Having John back and the family all together again should be too good to be true. There must be a catch. And there is, as Dean soon discovers.Coda to 14x13 "Lebanon"





	let me hold your heart

**Author's Note:**

> well here's this because I haven't written in such a long time and this episode was kinda underwhelming. accidentally did this instead of my homework uhhh enjoy

_“Kill them,” Zachariah commanded. Without hesitation, Cas started towards them, and Dean pulled out the angel blade in self-defense. Even then, though, staring at the murderous, obedient angel advancing on him, Dean knew he couldn’t kill him. No matter what he didn’t remember._  


Dean should have known he couldn’t have it all. 

When Sam had been suspicious of everything, of this seemingly perfect family reunion, of course Dean knew that he might be right. Of course he knew that things rarely worked out in their favor, and that this was too good to be true, but the little kid in him just wanted his mom and dad. He thought maybe he could keep them safe and together for the first time since he was four. So he kept his hopes up.

The first sign that something was wrong came in the liquor store. Jackson hadn’t had the slightest clue who Dean was, despite the fact that he was likely the store’s most frequent customer. When Dean had the sense to look himself and Sam up on the internet, dread crept up through his veins, and the feeling only grew when Sam explained the temporal paradox to him. He tried to imagine it: hunting, same as usual, but alone, with Sam off somewhere being a snotty god awful anti-family internet personality. He shuddered at the thought. Still, though, his mind raced with ways that they could try to fix it, hoping for some impossible win-win solution.

None of those solutions had taken _this_ into account. Dean was up against the wall (a painfully familiar position), held there by a very powerful, very incognizant Angel of the Lord. Cas had no recollection of who they were–of who _Dean_ was, and it hurt so much more than the bruises forming on his face and the hand around his throat. Dean reached for him, one hand around his wrist and the other desperately grasping for his chest, trying to make some connection so Cas might _feel_ and understand and remember who he was.  

But he didn’t, and Sam banished him just in the nick of time.

 

The car ride home was nearly silent. Dean was determined, resolute on what they had to do, and Sam knew it. It would hurt, sending John back, taking him away from their mom again, and it would be agonizing to break the news to them after seeing them so happy together. But they knew it had to be done, and Cas was the last straw. Dean was trying not to think about the way he had looked at them, with a blank stare and empty eyes, void of the past decade and everything it entailed, or about the way he had squinted and tilted his head when he first called his name. It was too reminiscent of Cas in a way that wasn’t _his_ Cas, and seeing him like that nearly felt like Dean had lost him all over again. Except he wasn’t going to let that happen.

So when they got back to the bunker, Dean went to tell their dad what they had to do, while Sam told Mary. And they all ate their family dinner after all before it was time for John to go. The goodbyes were tearful–Sam and Dean hated that they had to lose their dad so soon after getting him back, with all that they explained and still so much left to say, and Mary was absolutely heartbroken. But Sam smashed the pearl and just like that John was gone, and Lebanon resumed it’s normal, undisturbed pace.

Not a moment after John had vanished, the bunker door opened to usher in Cas, and relief filled Dean like a flood.

“What happened?” he asked, to Sam’s incredulous laughter.

“‘What happened,’” he echoed, before looking at Dean.

“Well, there’s a story,” Dean said, and then it was all he could do to stare for what was probably too long, reassuring himself that Cas was back and that he _remembered._

 

_“Cas, you know us.”_

_“I don’t know you.”_

When Dean woke up in a sweat in the middle of the night with images of Cas smiting him burned to the back of his eyelids, he felt ridiculous for getting so worked up about the encounter with the alternate timeline’s iteration of the angel. Cas was back. He was hardly even gone. Dean scolded himself mentally and tried to go back to sleep, but before he could lay his head back on his pillow there was a knock at his door.

“Yeah?” The door opened slowly and Cas stepped carefully into the bedroom, light from the hall falling dimly on the floor.

“Dean, are you alright? I heard you call out.” Dean didn’t even want to know what he said. He shut his eyes and sighed before replying.

“I’m fine. Just a nightmare.” Cas walked over and sat at the foot of Dean’s bed, and silence fell over the two of them as the moments passed.

“I meant to ask,” Cas said, gesturing to Dean’s bruised face, “did I... do that to you?”

“It wasn’t you, Cas.”

“I’m sorry.”

“It wasn’t you.”

“I know.” Another pause. “May I?”

Dean nodded, and Cas moved closer to gently touch his cheek, blue-white grace emanating from his hand. Dean’s eyes closed as the scrapes healed and disappeared, but Cas didn’t pull back. Dean leaned into the touch, and when he finally opened his eyes, there were tears in them.

“Dean, what’s wrong?” Cas asked, pulling his hand away in alarm. “Did I-” Dean caught his wrist before it could fall to his lap and held it tight.

“Cas,” he pleaded, “it wasn’t _you._ ” Dean placed his free hand over Cas’s chest as a tear ran down his cheek. “Can- can you feel this?”

“I don’t understand, Dean. I’m-”

“Just…” His voice was pained. “Please, Cas. Tell me you can feel me and that you- that you _know_ me. I need you to know me.”

It dawned on Cas that Dean had been more affected by the day’s ordeal than he let on, specifically by the run-in with Zachariah and his alternate self. He wiped away Dean’s tears with his thumb before letting his hand rest on his cheek.

“I know you, Dean Winchester. I know every inch of your soul, every piece of your being and I swear to you, it’s not something I could ever forget.”

Dean closed his eyes again, releasing a heavy shaking breath and whispering,

“I can’t lose you again.” And so Castiel just held him and lied through his teeth,

 

“You won’t.”


End file.
